Off Magic: Horror Star Ingrid Pitt Dies

[Richard Kaufman]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2010/nov ... -pitt-dies

If you don't know who Ingrid Pitt is, shame on you.

Go and rent one of these flicks:

The House That Dripped Blood (1970)
The Vampire Lovers (1970)
Countess Dracula (1971)
The Wicker Man (1973)

[Kevin Connolly]

I always wanted to see the Wicker Man. Edward Woodward, The Equalizer, starred in it. I liked him that TV series. He died this time last year.

Maybe I'll go track down the movie now.

[Joneseymagic]

Ingrid Pitt appeared as a guest on the first episode of 'The Mind of David Berglas'.

Incidentally, film fans should definitely check out 'The Wicker Man' - especially the 102 minute version! One of the best horror films ever made!

[Richard Kaufman]

And here it is on YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yIj99bnOhzA

[Bob Cassidy]

Thanks for posting that clip, Richard.

I remember all of those films. I was a big fan of everything that Hammer put out.

RIP Ingrid Pitt.

[Ryan Matney]

What a shame!

First Roy Ward Baker this year and now Ingrid Pitt.

She was quite the fox in those movies.

[Robert Allen]

Last movie I saw her in was Wild Geese 2 IIRC. That was the 80's and she was still look'n goooood.

[AJM]

Seek out Marcus Hearn's book 'Hammer Glamour' which is devoted to the foxy laydeez who graced the Hammer films throughout the 60's and 70's.

My particular favourite was the angelic (and I have to say extremely voluptuous) Madeleine Smith, who incidentally graces the cover of the aforementioned tome.

Mr Hearn has published a number of books on Hammer which, aside from it's prolific horror output, also had a sideline in producing movie versions of successful British sitcoms of the day (On The Buses or Holiday On The Buses anyone?)

Hammer afficionados should also seek out the DVD Box Set of the Hammer House of Horror TV series from 1980 - a series of 1 hour stories featuring the cream of British acting talent of that time - Pierce Brosnan, Peter Cushing, Diana Dors, Denholm Elliot etc.

Ingrid - fangs for the for the mamm....sorry, memories.

Cheers

Andrew

[Oli Foster]

I'm with Joneseymagic in recommending The Wicker Man - absolutely cracking film! - and genuinely odd as a piece of horror - the payoff in broad daylight with a load of people happily singing: bizarre - welcome to Scotland! I've no idea why they decided to remake it with Nicholas Cage (as fine an actor as he is) It's just not something that can be transposed as a Hollywood film - and that's an interesting thing on Hammer as well - the cashing in factor.

I enjoyed watching Mark Gatis's History of Horror on BBC recently (if you can catch this on Iplayer, it's well worth a watch and Hammer get a good mention with some of the above films)I like the fact that Hammer was the UK's low budget crack at competing with Universal under slightly BMovieish banners, but they created something distinctive in the process - a slightly ropeyish corny quality carried off with utmost sincerity, like the best plays. Christopher Lee as the iconic Dracula and, I'm given to understand, the first to actually have extended canine fangs and nice technicolour blood (Nosferatu's dodgy front teeth apparently don't count). Now that was a proper vampire - not these twinkly twilight lasses.

Speaking of which, I'm also led to believe that Nosferatu was a piece of anti-semitic propaganda and I don't know whether it's making something out of nothing but those charts he consults at the table do look somewhat kabbalistic and it doesn't seem politically impossible at the time but again probably conspiracy theory. In fact, is the whole vampire genre itself, from Bram Stoker onwards, a xenophobic metaphor (perhaps a rejected GCSE film studies question.) something about coming over and corrupting our women with the more commercial focus on the latter. I think this other element of female subjugation probably also ties in with similar trends in magic from Selbit onwards.

Off-topic, (but you'll see very slightly significant), I've recently got into Fritz Lang's Metropolis. It's quite literally like nothing I've ever seen (although bits of it rang bells from being referenced elsewhere), like gothic, art deco, sci fi - visually extraordinary. I've no idea what the ending means - something about mediation and I can't see how that relates to the duality of the fairer sex but another cracking old film nonetheless. Apparently they've discovered the missing reels of film that (and here's the magic connection) Channing Pollock cut out because he didn't feel the original german story of an evil female doppelganger would sit well on distributing to UK and American audiences, so he rewrote it as a kind of 'ultimate robot worker' scenario, which made far less sense in those still relatively chauvenistic days, given it was a chick. Consequently one of our most iconic magicians is responsible for the destruction of one of our most iconic (but, in present form) incomprehensible films. Magic and films don't seem to mix, as it's probably true that one renders the other redundant so perhaps, if we're overthinking it, this 'director's cut' was almost an oedipal act on Pollock's part to dum down an artistic alternative entertainment. I recall he made some comments about the robot Maria making an uncomfortable bedfellow. Hmmm. However, the prestige appears to form the exception to this not-mixing rule.

Quite excited by the look of that new Art of Tim Burton book - It almost sounds as genuinely covetable as the new Berglas book and I'm still trying to decide which one I want more for Christmas.

What the devil am I talking about? Where am I? Ah well...

Ingrid, I'm sure this isn't the end - ah ah ah!

[Doug Thornton]

Oh, to be British for a day and be able to say "cracking" in a sentence!
I'll just echo the exuberance of Oli and Joneseymagic (and Richard) and agree that "The Wicker Man" is a film to see.
Rest in peace, Ingrid Pitt.

[Richard Kaufman]

Ms. Pitt makes the New York Times:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/25/arts/ ... l?_r=1&hpw

[Paul Gordon]

I knew Ingrid Pitt fairly well in the 70's. (She was a friend of Francis DeWolff (Hammer star PHOTO below) who was a good friend of my fathers.) Boy, was she sexy! Through Francis, I also met one of my heroes - Peter Cushing. He was a lovely man...

Paul Gordon (Hammer Horror nut)

btw: remember her in Where Eagles Dare?

[IrishMagicNews]

Paul,

Boy, she was indeed!